WelcomHeritage Badi Kothi

Badi Kothi was the residence of the zamindar Perumal, and its past is written all over it. Under the British Raj it served as a headquarters for tax collection — defaulters were held in the jail built inside the premises, which you can still see. Mahatma Gandhi, Jawaharlal Nehru and Lal Bahadur Shastri all visited; Shastri lodged here with his family, and legend has it that the saint-poet Mirabai stayed too. During the independence years, a printing press inside the kothi put out poems and articles about a free India.

The building itself is the draw: an original sandstone façade, pietra dura carvings on the temple, jharokha balconies and courtyards lined with stained-glass doors that glow like jewels after dark. The restoration keeps all of that while adding the comforts you actually want — air-conditioned rooms, a lift, Wi-Fi and a rooftop pool that looks out over the river.

There are just 21 rooms in three types, each named for a piece of the house: Kivaad Rooms after the old ornamental doorways, Gaukha Rooms after the centuries-old jharokha-style carvings, and the Shastri Suites after their most famous lodger. On the ground floor is a pure-vegetarian restaurant serving Allahabadi dishes you will struggle to find elsewhere — nimona, fara, khasta kachori, taheri — alongside the usual Indian, Chinese and Italian menus.

The location is the other half of the story. This is Daraganj, the old riverside quarter: Sita Samahit Sthal is 60 metres away, the Veni Madhav temple 300 metres, and the Triveni Sangam — the confluence of the Ganga, Yamuna and the unseen Saraswati — about five minutes by road. Varanasi is roughly two hours away, which makes this a natural heritage stop on the Varanasi–Prayagraj–Lucknow run.